Leaflet. No to the bloodbath in Burma

• 140,000 people in refugee camps
• 100,000 refugees try to escape in boats
• Tens of thousands died on the sea and in Burma itself

The Rohingya are a minority population in the northwest of Burma (the dictatorship renamed the country into ‘Myanmar’). The Rohingya have been oppressed for decades, since the early 1980s they even lost their nationality rights. The regime sees them as foreigners, refugees from Bangladesh. But the Rohingya already live in the province of Arakan (Rakhine) for centuries. Tens of thousands of Rohingya fled to neighbouring Bangladesh. This country cannot deal with all the refugees. Tens of thousands others try to get to Malaysia, Indonesia or Thailand over sea. Thousands died.

The dictatorial regime of Burma oppresses different minorities, including Rohingya but also the Chinese minority. In 2012 the whole world was lining up to visit Burma when limited democratic reforms were announced. Now the international leaders remain silent. The European, including the Belgian, leaders don’t react as they don’t want to lose access to the rich ressources of Burma including oil. Rohingya are oppressed because of their ethnic background and their religion. The official opposition around Nobel Peace Price winner Aung San Suu Kyi doesn’t say anything on the violence and the oppression.

The international community of the establishment is failing to react. The least we can do, is to show that there is a different international community, the community of ordinary workers and their families. With a solidarity protest on July 10th in Antwerp we show our protest against the oppression of Rohingya. We support the need of a mass movement of below against the Burmese dictatorship to defend the right of selfdetermination of all minorities and to fight for better living conditions. Join the protest!

Friday 10 july at 15h on Sint-Jansplein (Antwerp)

Action supported by activists from Kashmiri background, Tamil background, Kurdisch background, left socialist LSP and others.
birmaprotest.wordpress.com